


Burned

by HarrisonHolmes2014



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Car Accidents, Episode: s03e01 The Empty Hearse, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Hospitalization, Original Hooper-Holmes Child(ren), POV Sherlock Holmes, Parentlock, Sherlock Holmes Has Feelings, Sherlock Holmes and Feelings, Single Parent Molly Hooper, Trauma, Uncle John Watson
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-30
Updated: 2014-12-30
Packaged: 2018-03-03 18:45:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2863415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HarrisonHolmes2014/pseuds/HarrisonHolmes2014
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When a car accident sends his daughter Moira to the hospital, Sherlock Holmes has to confront something quite frightening: The messiness of emotions. And those emotions aren't just for his daughter, either...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Burned

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Breakable](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2522717) by [MissDavis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissDavis/pseuds/MissDavis). 



> Continuation of my earlier Sherlock fanfic, "Chemical Reactions." Many thanks to MissDavis, whose writing inspired the accident/hospital scenes.

The lit streetlamps glitter in the night, bathing everything in a soft orange glow. Here and there patches of ice glisten on the dark asphalt. It’s been another long day at the lab, but the girl next to me in the cab shows no signs of exhaustion. Moira’s dark-haired head is bent over a book, one of her first two Christmas gifts from me: _A Teenager’s Guide to the Periodic Table of the Elements. _She can read most of it, even though she’s two years old, or two years and three months, as she would insist I describe her age.__

“How do you like the book?” I ask her.

“Shh,” she says shortly, not even lifting her eyes from the chart at the front. “I’m reading. I want to tell Mummy and Khan about it.”

I can’t help smiling at the mention of the black kitten, named when Moira overheard her mum watching _Star Trek. _“I’ll leave you to it, then.” She nods vaguely. With my peripheral vision, I see her closing her eyes and her thin lips forming words:_ Hydrogen, helium, silver, gold, neon, magnesium, tungsten…_she’ll be one hell of a chemist one day if she keeps this up.

My phone chirps; a text. It’s from Molly: _Let me know when you’re bringing Moira back. _I answer, telling her we’ve just left St. Bart’s and are on the way. Ever since I came back, my exchanges with Molly Hooper have mostly conformed to this pattern of brevity and formality, especially when her fiancée (whatever his name is) is around. One judging from our conversation alone would guess that Molly and I are virtual strangers.__

They, of course, would be mistaken. Moira is evidence to the contrary.

We round the corner, and out of nowhere glaring white light fills the cab like a flash of divine inspiration. Car horns blare wildly in the night and brakes scream as the light solidifies into two bright circles. Before I can even think to act, the truck strikes and the entire cab shudders as metal and glass crunch with the impact. Both vehicles spiral off across the icy streets, grinding and shrieking like unleashed demons.

I struggle out of my safety belt and hurtle to the other side of the whirling cab, where Moira’s screaming and covering her head with her arms. I curl my entire body around her, pressing her head to my chest. Then a lion’s roar of fire drowns out every other sound, and a massive orange explosion reeking of petrol sends the cab flying. For a moment my stomach leaps with the sensation of weightlessness, but then we crash back to earth and I get flung into the seat in front of me. Pain stabs the back of my head and stars explode before my eyes, but all that matters to me is that Moira didn’t get thrown forward. Slowly, the cab eventually skids to a halt.

Once the cab stops, there’s a moment of relief as I hear Moira’s trembling sobs. But then I notice it’s hot, too hot. I open my eyes to a raging fireball engulfing the cab, gobbling the upholstery and starting on my coat. Screams attack my ears once more, but now they’re screams of agony, and they’re coming from the little girl in the seat in front of me. I look up quickly and feel my heart stop.

Ravenous, petrol-driven flames sear up Moira’s small legs, burning away her clothing and reaching the exposed skin. Her skin creates a sickly sweet smell like burning pigs as the fire claims it. The orange demons race to her arms and leap into her hair, and her shrieks reach a deafening pitch.

Letting out a yell of horror the likes of which I’d never imagined I was capable of, I rip her out of her safety belt. Hugging her tightly to me, I claw my way out of the shattered back window. I don’t let her go, even as the insatiable fire spreads to my own hands. We spill out onto the damp pavement, our bodies glowing like torches, and I roll both of us across the ground until the flames die, my ears filled with my daughter’s never-ending screams.  
_____________

I weave silently down the dark halls of St. Bart’s, heading for the employees’ locker rooms. It’s ten p.m. precisely, the end of Molly Hooper’s shift. Perhaps I should have contacted John, to let him know that the past two years have all been a charade. But Molly’s the one who made it possible. She should know first, realise that the risk she took in assisting me wasn’t in vain.

There’s another reason I need to see Molly first. A reason I didn’t even know existed until Mycroft told me when I arrived home. My heart beats faster as I remember him showing me the photographs of them. Molly in her white lab coat, her smooth blonde-brown hair pulled back in a neat ponytail. Beside her, holding her hand, a little girl, with a shock of dark brown curls.

Mycroft explained most of it. Moira Turing Hooper was her full name. She could read and speak on a five-year-old level. She was born on October 19th, 2011, the year I free-fell off of St. Bart’s rooftop, almost exactly nine months afterward. As if anyone needed more hints, Mycroft put it, she bore absolutely no physical resemblance to Molly…but she did to me. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing and seeing, yet all the evidence confirmed it.

I had a daughter.

So, all things considered, I need to see Molly and ask after Moira first. How Molly will react to my reappearance, given the circumstances I unwittingly put her in, I’m not quite sure. When I reach the locker rooms, I only see one other figure through the frosted glass, a shadowy form I know very well. I wait until she turns the corner and quietly let myself in.

Molly stands with her back to me, her head slightly bowed and her shoulders sloped. Judging from that, it’s been a trying day for her. Most likely she had to lay out someone young today, someone who died far before their time. Since I can’t see her face, I find myself focusing on the long, blonde-brown ponytail falling between her shoulder blades, with a playful curl at the end. I’d almost forgotten how her hair curls like that when she pulls it back. I don’t speak; I just watch her fold her arms and gaze silently at her locker, clearly lost in her own thoughts.

Her arms uncross, as if she’s suddenly come back to earth, and she sighs a little as she opens the locker door. Her left hand glitters as it passes under the light. There’s a flash of silver, the mirror inside the locker, and it catches my reflection. Molly quite literally jumps: her feet leave the white-tiled floor, and she lets out a gasp of terror and turns faster than I’ve ever seen her move. Her pale face and wide chocolate-brown eyes read complete, utter shock.

It looks like there might be something else in the mix too, but I’ve never been brilliant at reading facial expressions.  
_______________

Moira’s shaking and sobbing, her small hand closed tight on the edge of my coat. I’m so focused on that, I barely even notice the stinging in my hands, painful but only strong enough to suggest first-degree burns. _What would your average father do in this situation, _I ask myself._ Of course, stupid: comfort her._

“It’s all right, Moira,” I whisper to her, slowly, carefully uncurling myself from around her. “It’s all right, I’m here.” I tear off my coat and wrap it around her. I can’t touch fresh burns with my bare hands. She sobs a little harder at the pressure of the fabric. “Shh, shh, it’s all right,” I tell her again, running a hand through her hair. The singed dark curls crackle under my fingertips.

_Why the bloody hell am I saying it’s all right when it’s not? ___

_Don’t think like that. Assess the damage and do something useful. _Taking a deep, calming breath, I examine Moira’s face. It and her arms are covered in blistering red streaks, second-degree burns. Tears sparkle in the scarlet welts on her cheeks. I don’t want to look at her legs, where the scorching must have been the worst, but I have to. So I do, and my stomach turns. Both of her legs are covered in stiff, whitish-brown burns: third-degrees. Fiery red rings extend up around the sickly, off-white parts.__

My phone is out before I can even take it in, before I process what exactly I’m seeing. Still supporting Moira with one arm, I stammer into the phone, “I need an ambulance. At the junction of Liverpool Street and Old Broad Street. Please, send someone here now.”

The woman who answered the call obviously does not register the seriousness in my voice. She rattles off a long list of completely inane questions. I understand why the location and Moira’s age are important – she’s a child, she’ll need specialised equipment – but I can’t see how anything else is relevant. I answer the questions to the best of my ability until the pressure finally snaps me. “Why the hell should any of this matter?” I roar into the mouthpiece. “My daughter is dying, for God’s sake get a fucking ambulance over here!”

At last the responder understands. She assures me that an ambulance will be there soon and hangs up. I fling the phone aside and turn my attentions back to Moira. She’s finally stopped crying, but now she’s shuddering worse than ever, and not just from the cold. She’s going into shock. I wrap the coat a little tighter around her, as tight as I dare.

“Am I really dying, Daddy?” she asks. Amazingly, she doesn’t sound afraid, only curious.

_I don’t know, and I really don’t like not knowing right now. _“No,” I tell her, noting that my voice is shaking. “No, you’ll…you’ll be fine, love.”__

“Oh. You said I was.” She winces, and her hand clenches on the fabric of my shirt. “It hurts,” she moans.

_Assess the damage again. Do it now. _“Tell me where it hurts,” I command gently.__

“My face, my arms.”

She doesn’t mention her legs. The fact that she feels no pain confirms the burns as third-degree, serious enough to damage the nerves. _Shit. Shit, shit, shit. Why can’t that goddamn ambulance get here already? ___

_Calm yourself. Stay in control, you’ll only scare Moira otherwise. _I run one hand through her hair again, knowing it soothes people. “Did you get burned too?” she asks vaguely. Her blue-grey eyes are drooping.__

“A bit, yes, but not badly. Try and stay awake for me, all right?”

She nods and leans her head against my chest. “I feel bad,” she murmurs. “Khan will be hungry.” Her shoulders shake with tears again.

I close my eyes, struggling with the bizarre impulse to laugh at the irony. She’s been in a horrible accident, and she’s worried about not feeding her kitten. “Don’t worry, darling. I’m – ” The words stick in my throat, making my voice jump about an octave. I swallow hard, shoving the horror, the terror, back down to where I won’t feel it until I can afford to. “I’m sure Mummy will feed him for you tonight,” I manage.

She nods weakly, and then her head slides slightly down my chest. “Moira,” I say quietly, squeezing her shoulder as lightly as possible. She doesn’t respond. She’s still, unnaturally still. “Moira,” I repeat, louder, and when she doesn’t do anything a dull whine of panic starts up inside my head. _No. Oh, please God, no, not my daughter. You can have me, take me instead... ___

_Don’t panic. Use your logic. Check for a pulse. _I place two fingers on Moira’s neck, and I can feel a slow yet steady rhythm under her skin. Somehow, the fact that she’s unconscious instead of dead only amplifies the whir of panic in my head. _What if she slides over the edge, from a temporary loss of consciousness into a permanent one? _____

_No. You mustn’t let yourself think that. _Instead, I hold her tightly, trying to talk myself into believing she won’t slide over that edge. Almost as if I’m seeing another person’s reaction, I note that my burned hands are trembling violently. Try as I might, I can’t make the tremors stop, and the voice of logic in my head chuckles ruefully._ Look at you, Holmes, unable to divorce yourself from fear._

The rising and falling cries of an ambulance reach my ears at last. Four paramedics tumble out of the vehicle and rush towards us, skidding a bit on the ice. Two of them, a man and a woman, take me under the arms and start getting me to my feet, and the others remove Moira. Carefully, they strap her to a stretcher and race towards the ambulance with her. As they pass under a nearby streetlamp, the white-brown burns streaking up her legs are thrown into even greater relief.

I’ve handled the evening relatively well up until now, but my body can’t take the stress any longer. I turn away from the two paramedics holding me and vomit what remains of supper into the street. Neither of them releases me. Instead, the male paramedic pats me on the arm. “It’s all right,” he says. “That’s a normal reaction. Your daughter’s fainted, but she’ll be fine.”

 _I know she’s fainted, idiot, I saw it happen. And don’t tell me she’ll be fine until she wakes up and can take off running through my flat. _Though whether or not she’ll ever be able to use her legs again after those burns, and the inevitable damage to the leg nerves, remains to be seen. But I can’t,_ won’t_ allow myself to think that until I know all the facts and have no choice but to accept it as true. Somehow, I hold back the impulse to curse his calmness to the depths of hell.

The woman lets go of my arm and shoves my phone into my hand. “You can only go in the ambulance with her if you’ve gotten everything out of your stomach,” she says sternly.

I nod and attempt to straighten my coat like I normally do, to give the impression of calm. But my hands meet only air. I forgot that I wrapped Moira in the coat. “I’m well enough, thank you,” I tell them, again attempting and failing to sound in control. The woman narrows her eyes suspiciously, but she nods.

The two paramedics help me clamber into the ambulance. One of the ones who brought Moira in silently hands me my coat. Moira is still unconscious, a tiny oxygen mask clamped over her mouth. Her right hand dangles limply over the side of the stretcher, and I take it as we speed off into the night, feeling her small fingers curled weakly in my palm.

Dimly I realize that someone else needs to be aware of what’s happening. With my other, shaking hand, I dial Molly’s number.  
___________________

"She knows who you are."

It’s the first time Molly’s spoken since I told her I wanted to meet Moira. Her voice snaps my mind back to the present. It had been whirling with questions about the little girl with the dark curly hair. "What?"

She gives me a sidelong glance, but looks away when I notice. Her right hand plays, seemingly unconsciously, with the diamond ring on her left. As we pass under a streetlamp, its gold band doesn’t gleam very brightly. Suggestive, given that it has to be less than six months old. Molly’s chest rises and falls in an almost imperceptible sigh. "Moira knows about you."

"You told her?"

"No. She found an old photograph of you and saw that you looked like her. She’s good at putting two and two together like that. I just thought I should tell you now, so it’s not so much of a shock when she recognizes you." Her tone is flat, emotionless, somewhere between restraint and pure coldness.

My head spins a little more. In addition to speaking and reading like a five-year-old, Moira has enough self-awareness to know what she looks like, and to notice similarities between herself and others. Given these signs of preternatural intelligence, she most likely understands what my absence has meant for Molly, for John, for everyone involved with me. And if she can comprehend all of this, how will she react to me when she sees me?

With Molly, the answer to that question is obvious. We’ve barely spoken this whole ride back. I’d never try to pretend I’m good with emotions, but logic helps me to understand. She’s had to raise a child alone for two years, which I imagine has to be difficult. But how do I apologize to her for putting her in such a predicament? Words can’t make up for lost time. So, instead of trying to apologize, I hold my tongue.

The cab gradually pulls to a stop outside a small apartment building. Molly pays before I can offer to, and I follow her out of the vehicle and up the stairs. 305, I remember the number as well as I recall my own. "Rent’s gone up again. I’ve had to get a flatmate," she says as she pushes the key into the lock. "Sarah works from home, so she can look after Moira when I’m at work."

I’m desperately curious as to why Molly hasn’t moved in with her fiancée yet. But I seriously doubt that asking will make this tense situation any better. I make a noncommittal noise in the back of my throat and Molly opens the door.

The flat looks almost exactly as I remember it: the stuffed bookshelves, the faded red sofa, the simple wooden kitchen table. But now models of horses and test-tubes from a child’s chemistry set are scattered across the floor. Dozens of books lie among the toys. As Molly sets her purse and lab coat on the sofa, I ask where the cat Toby is.

"Dead," she says shortly, swiping her thumb across her phone. "He got sick last year and we had to put him down. Moira was devastated. She’s already begging me to get another cat."

"Oh. I’ll get her a kitten for Christmas, then."

"A kitten. You think I have time to teach Moira to house-train a kitten?"

"Well, your flatmate Sarah can help her. Besides, the girl’s a five-year-old trapped inside a toddler’s body, apparently. She can handle it."

"Sherlock, no."

"Why not? Having her own pet will be good for her, teach her some responsibility."

"Hmm. I’m not sure I want _you _teaching Moira about responsibilities," Molly says quietly, not looking at me. She goes into the hall leading to the bedrooms, calling for Moira.__

Then I hear it: a little girl’s voice, somewhere in the soprano range of the violin, crying gleefully, "Mummy!" The girl goes off on a rapid-fire description of her day, from drawing a picture of a horse to learning that salt and sugar both go away if you stir them into water. Her vocabulary is surprisingly advanced for her age. I close my eyes, wanting her to keep talking so I can memorize exactly what her voice sounds like.

Molly praises the drawing and the salt and sugar experiment. Then, in a more serious tone: "Moira, love, there’s someone here. Come and say hello." I hear the two of them stand, the soft rustle of Molly’s khakis and the thumps of Moira’s feet on the floorboards. I wait, wondering why my heart is beating so fast for standing still.

Molly comes around the corner, and it takes a moment for my eyes to travel to the child standing beside her. Moira Hooper is incredibly tall for a two-year-old, almost a third of Molly’s height. A good chunk of that height is taken up by dark brown curls exploding in every direction. She holds a book in her left hand: _Chemistry in Your Own Kitchen. _Her cheeks go pale the instant she sees me, and she drops the book. There’s only a moment of shocked silence, but it seems like an age.__

Then a smile breaks across Moira’s face. Before Molly or I can even open our mouths, she shrieks with delight and charges at me, throwing her arms around my right calf. "Daddy!" she exclaims, hugging my leg so tightly that it cuts off my circulation.

I’ve heard the word countless times before. But the exposure could never have prepared me for hearing someone call me that. Wanting to get a better look at Moira, I gently prise her hands from my leg and kneel in front of her. And I see her eyes for the first time: clear, blue-grey spheres, shining more brightly than stars. Looking into them, I think that those eyes could see into my very soul if she wanted them to. With a vaguely uncomfortable squirming sensation in my stomach, I realize that my own eyes must have the same penetrating effect.

For the first time in my life, I can’t think of anything to say. I put my hands on Moira’s shoulders, still staring into her thin, high-cheekboned face, unable to get enough of the sight of her. She has heterochromia too: as I look at her, the blue-grey shifts to a brilliant green, flecked with gold. Her dark eyebrows contract, and her head tilts curiously. "Why are you staring at me, Daddy?" 

I put one hand in her wild curls and then on her cheek. If I can feel her, she must be real. "Because I don’t want to look away," I hear myself answering. Glancing over her head, I can see Molly still standing at the hall entrance, and she looks down when she notices. But I glimpse the tears glistening on her face before she can hide them.  
_______________

The hospital hallway shines with an otherworldly gleam, white fluorescent lights glaring down on impeccably clean blue-grey tile. Doctors and nurses in their neat white uniforms bustle back and forth. All the white makes me think of ice, of bones, of the bodies I’ve seen at crime scenes, wrapped in pale shrouds.

Outside the burn unit, Molly sits on my left, John on my right. With my peripheral vision, I can see Molly’s hands in her lap, clenched and trembling. She arrived just after Moira went in, her hair undone and her face pale, and John came ten minutes later. She called him the instant I told her what had happened. It makes sense that he should be here: from what he’s told me, he helped out with Moira when she was first born. “Uncle John,” she calls him.

Aside from demanding to know what happened and if Moira was alive, Molly hasn’t said a word since she got here. I realize I’m supposed to comfort her right now. That’s what people do when someone goes to the hospital. But I can’t do it. Not when my brain’s been fighting a violent battle against total panic for the past three hours.

At last, the doors to the burn unit bang open, and Molly, John and I leap to our feet. One of the doctors breaks away from the group pushing a small trolley. The badge on his coat says “D. Stentson.” He takes both me and Molly by the arms and gently turns us away from the doctors pushing Moira past. Typical hospital tactic, not letting parents see the state their child is in at first. Trying to spare them as long as possible.

The doctor’s talking, describing what they’ve done to help Moira so far: removing dead skin, doing grafts to the worst burns, getting her on fluids. My ears only catch random phrases as he tells us what she’ll need next. Severe damage to the leg nerves. Several months of convalescing. Intense physical therapy.

“But will those burns stop her from walking?” Molly asks, her voice several notes higher than usual.

“After they heal, she’ll most likely regain the use of her legs,” Dr. Stentson says, placing a hand on Molly’s shoulder.

“Most likely,” I repeat furiously. “That’s all you can tell us, is that you only _think _she’ll be able to walk again?”__

“Sherlock,” John says quietly, but I ignore him.

“Tell me those burns won’t paralyze her. Please,” I say to Dr. Stentson. I’ve never heard myself beg for anything before.

The doctor’s calm expression flickers into pity, and the hand on my arm squeezes it slightly. “I’m sorry I can’t promise anything at this point, Mr. Holmes,” he says softly.

_I don’t want your sympathy. I want you to stop my daughter from being paralyzed for the rest of her life. _I close my eyes, trying to regain some modicum of calm, and Dr. Stentson’s voice breaks into the darkness behind my eyelids. “You’re all welcome to stay with her tonight. We’ve moved her to a family room in intensive care. She’s on a morphine drip for the pain, so she’ll probably be knocked out until morning.”__

“Thank you, doctor,” John answers. He leads the way to Moira’s room. It’s almost completely dark, save for the glowing machines surrounding the little girl on the bed: the heart rate monitor, IVs streaming painkillers into her veins and replacing her fluids. The machines’ light illuminates the stiff white bandages obscuring the second-degree facial burns. With the array of tubes and wires connecting Moira to the machines, she looks like something that crawled out of a science fiction film. I curb the mad impulse to charge over, shake her awake, and demand that she try and move her toes.

John sinks into one of the molded plastic chairs near the door, gazing blankly at Moira. Molly, however, remains standing. Her brown eyes glow with an odd spark, anger or pain I can’t tell, as she looks at me. “How bad was it, Sherlock?” she asks.

“You heard the doctor. It wasn’t good,” I answer flatly.

“Show me. I want to see it for myself. I want to know.”

I shake my head. Incredibly, I feel a smile curling my lips, a smile of sick irony. “No, actually, you don’t want to see,” I tell her.

Her face flushes, definitely with anger, and her hands clench in fists. “I need to,” she says, her voice going low and dangerous.

“What good will it do her, or you?” I demand. “Will you seeing the burns make them disappear? Try to be logical.”

I shouldn’t have said it. Instantly Molly snaps: she throws her purse at me as hard as she can, and it knocks me backwards a bit when I catch it. Her face the color of hot coals, she screams at the top of her lungs, _“Fuck your logic! Sherlock Holmes, you let me see my daughter! NOW!” ___

Her anger only makes mine worse. I fling the purse to the floor, my own hands shaking, the blood rushing to my cheeks. Keys, a lipstick tube, and several receipts fly out the top of the bag. I stride furiously over to Moira’s bedside. “Right,” I snarl, placing one hand on the sheet. “You want to see? You want to look at how bad it is? Well, _here.” ___

I yank the sheet back, revealing the two columns of bandages that were once Moira’s legs. Molly’s reaction is just what I expect. Her cheeks whiten and her eyes close, seemingly a reflex. I can see her chest rising and falling faster, and her body swaying back and forth slightly, as the shock takes over her. John leaps from the plastic chair and leads Molly over to it, and she collapses into it. “Oh, God,” she groans, her face in her hands. “Oh, my God, my God…”

She hasn’t cried all night, but now her shoulders tremble with sobs. John stands beside her and puts a hand on her shoulder, glaring at me. His message is completely clear: _You should be doing this, not me. _But why should I be the one to comfort her for a shock she asked for?__

I replace the sheet, hiding Moira’s legs once more, and turn away from the bed, and from John and Molly. Staring blankly at the window on the other side of the room, I say quietly, “I said you didn’t want to see.”  
_______________

Moira keeps me busy this evening. When I’m finally capable of taking my eyes off of her, she starts showing me her entire life. She takes me to her room and shows me her teddy bear, a ragged old thing that “Uncle John” gave her when she was born. She shows me her books, texts far beyond a two-year-old reading level: _The Giver, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, _primary-school history and chemistry books. She tells me all about how she and her mum listen to Motown, the Beatles, Beethoven and musical soundtracks during the evenings and weekends. I'm only able to get away for about five minutes, to place a phone call to the London Humane Society.__

The only reaction to her my dazed mind comes up with is wonder. Moira brims over with interests and curiosity, from music to science to the flights of her own imagination. She questions every piece of information she gets and doesn’t stop questioning until she finds an answer. And then she stuffs the answer into the corners of her brain for later. Part of me wonders how one head can possibly hold so much. But then, I suppose I could ask the same thing of my own mind.

At last, in the midst of Moira asking me whether or not I think a potato will explode if she puts it in the microwave, Molly calls to her from the kitchen. "Oops. Time for supper," Moira says. She races out to the kitchen and I follow her, trying to figure out where this child gets all her energy from. She comes out to the table, her hands full of cutlery, and gives me a handful, saying I can help too. The table’s being laid for four; it seems Molly isn’t angry enough to kick me out of the flat without food.

Throughout supper, nobody speaks much. Molly cooked spaghetti, and good God, I’d almost forgotten just how delicious her sauce is. Sarah, Molly’s short, mousy-haired flatmate, keeps giving me covert glares across the table. Molly, on the other hand, stares down at her pasta the whole time. Her fingers shake as she twirls the noodles around her fork. Clearly she’s burning to confront me, but doesn’t want to do it in front of Moira.

As I walk into the kitchen after supper, I hear Moira singing quietly as she rinses plates. She stumbles a bit over some of the old song's words, but mostly she handles it well. _"People say I'm the life of the party 'cause I tell a joke or two / Although I might be laughing loud and hearty, deep inside I'm blue / So take a good look at my face / You'll see my smile looks out of place / If you look closer, it's easy to trace / The tracks of my tears / I need you, need you." ___

"Very good," I tell her, handing her my plate. She tries not to smile, but her thin lips curve upwards as if she can’t help it. "Where did you learn that?"

"Mummy likes it. She sang it to me all the time when I was born."

I don’t respond. Moira doesn’t seem to realize quite what the song means, or what the implications of Molly singing it to her at that particular point in time are. And I’m not going to be the one to enlighten her. She holds my plate under the tap, still humming the melody, and spaghetti sauce runs off of it like a rust-colored river. "Mummy’s glad you're back, Daddy."

There’s that word again, the new name that I’m responding to. "Is she? I was under the impression she wasn’t that glad."

I hand Moira a third plate, and she scrubs the remains of the food from it. "Well, she’s mad at you. But she’s happy too."

"How can you tell?"

She grins. "She wasn’t looking at you during supper. But she was smiling a bit. I saw."

I have to work hard to contain my amazement at this. She’s deducing what is inside a person’s heart. Obviously she got that skill from Molly. "You’re quite observant, Moira."

"Ob-ser-vant," she repeats, carefully sounding out each syllable. After a moment of thinking, she asks, "Does it mean I see things that other people don’t?"

"Exactly." There’s a pause, and I help her clean sauce and bits of Italian sausage from some forks. Then, my heart beating a little faster, I ask her the question that’s been burning in the back of my mind. "You say your mum’s angry with me for not being here." I stop again, clearing my throat, trying not to anticipate her answer. "Are you?"

"Am I what?"

"Angry with me."

Moira looks at me for a minute. It’s not just a look: she studies me. Her eyes, hovering between blue-grey and green, flicker slowly between each of mine. She smiles, and there’s just a hint of sadness in her expression.

"No," she says. "Just don’t go away again."  
_________________

Hours have passed since Moira was moved to her own room. The darkness outside has reached a state of silken blackness that suggests it’s early morning. Two, maybe three, I have no idea. An endless stream of doctors has come into the room every hour to check on “the patient.” She hasn’t opened her eyes yet, due to the morphine. I’d give anything to have some of that, if only to quiet the steady moan of barely contained terror in my mind.

John gave in to exhaustion a while ago. He leans his head back against the white wall, fast asleep, his mouth hanging open slightly. But Molly’s still awake. After she calmed herself, she pulled her chair close to Moira and took her hand. She hasn’t moved or spoken since. The only way I know she hasn’t fallen into sleep is seeing the streetlamps’ glow reflected in her eyes.

How the hell can they be so still? All night I’ve paced the room like a caged lion wanting out. Although I’m trying not to come to conclusions about Moira’s situation before I get some facts, my brain won’t quiet down enough for me to be still. What will we have to do if her legs don’t start working properly again? I’d probably have to move out of Baker Street, for one thing; there’s no way a wheelchair could get up the stairs. Do they even make wheelchairs small enough for a two-year-old?

At last, my legs tire of pacing, and I sink into the empty chair next to Molly. She glances at me, but says nothing. Silver tear tracks glisten on her cheeks from when I showed Moira’s legs to her. A strange shrinking feeling weighs on my chest when I see the shining marks. I know it’s a waste of time to regret one’s words, yet here I am. Since when did this new caring what other people think of what I say develop?

Molly’s left hand rests on her knee. On an impulse, I reach out and place my own hand on top of hers, hoping she’ll know I’m trying to comfort her and not anything else. She gives a start at my touch, but doesn’t pull her hand away. In fact, for the first time this evening, she smiles slightly. It’s a very tight, strained smile, but a smile all the same.

“Easy,” she says quietly. “You know I’m not available anymore.”

She got the wrong message, but somehow I wind up jumping on her train of thought. “And yet, you haven’t tried to remove my hand.”

The flickering smile disappears in an instant. She pulls her hand out from beneath mine, and the sharp corners of her (filthy) engagement ring scrape my palm. “Now I have,” she says, turning away from me.

It spills out before I can try to stop it. “Molly, please don’t insult my intelligence by trying to convince me you’re in love with…with…”

“Tom,” she says. “And I do love him, thank you very much.”

“Really? That’s not the story your ring tells me,” I answer, taking her hand and holding it up to my eyes. “You’ve only been engaged to Tom for less than six months. But both the band and the diamond are absolutely filthy.”

“Sherlock,” she hisses in an ominous voice. I ignore her tone and carry on.

“And I’d be willing to bet that if I were to remove this ring – ”

“Don’t you dare,” she snarls, but I do it anyway and examine the inside.

“Mmm-hmm,” I say, holding the ring out to her. “The inside shines like it’s new. The only cleaning it gets is when you remove it, which is often judging from the brightness. Would a happily engaged woman refuse to clean her ring, or take it off every chance she gets?”

Molly yanks her hand from mine, leaving me holding her ring. From the way she’s flexing her fingers, she’s resisting the temptation to either slap me or strangle me. But the pale fringes in her angrily red cheeks tell me that she knows I have a point. I toss the ring into her lap, but she doesn’t put it back on. She releases Moira’s hand and clenches her own hands in her lap once more, so hard that her knuckles turn white.

“Why,” she demands shakily, _“why _must you always say such horrible things? Do you get pleasure out of it, Sherlock? Out of seeing other people in pain?”__

That shrinking feeling in my chest comes back. I look at Moira, still drugged up on the bed, and the fresh memories of her burning legs, her screams, swoop over me like shadows. “Do you really think this gives me pleasure?” I ask coldly.

Her face pales. “I’m sorry,” she stammers. “I didn’t mean – ”

I put my hand back on hers. “No,” I tell her. “I’m sorry.”

Molly’s dark eyes meet my own. Without my intending them to, more memories flood the front of my mind. Older and happier ones, memories of the three days and nights she kept me safe after the fall: watching her cook spaghetti sauce in her flat. Reading Shakespeare with her on that faded red sofa, her old cat Toby curled up between us. The kiss, and everything it led to.

I remember the last one especially well. My brain replayed the scene more than once during my time away from England. I can’t count the number of times I went through it all over again, in dreams, during those long nights sleeping alone. Feeling her heartbeat against my own chest, hearing her voice sigh my name, seeing the dilated pupils swallowing the brown irises of her eyes. Looking in her eyes now, they appear quite similar to what I recall. Perhaps I wasn’t the only one whose mind held on to the memories of that final night.

Molly turns her gaze back to Moira and takes her hand again. But her left hand stays in mine. Together we watch the heart rate monitor chugging out steady spikes, waiting.  
_______________

It’s midnight, well past time for Moira to go to bed. She comes out to the sitting-room, where Molly and I sit on opposite ends of the red sofa, reading and attempting to ignore each other’s presence. Moira walks to Molly and kisses her on the cheek, clutching her teddy bear.

"I’ll come and tuck you in," Molly begins, setting down her book. But a strange, sudden sense of duty takes me over, and I stand up before she can.

"I can do it," I tell her. Molly’s dark eyes stab me with unspoken reproaches: _Good. It’s about time you were here to tuck her in. _I say nothing, instead following Moira down the hall.__

In her room, Moira curls up under the purple and gold-striped comforter. What am I supposed to do again? Push the covers under her? Pull them up to her chin? I settle on a compromise: I push some of the covers under her shoulders. Apparently this action is suitable for the situation, because she smiles at me. "Daddy?"

I still haven’t gotten accustomed to being called that. But I like it nonetheless. "Yes?"

Moira’s thin cheeks flush slightly. "Do you like to sing?"

"I do. Why do you ask?"

"Mummy sings to me at night."

My heart flutters a bit with sudden nerves. I may like to sing, but I don’t do it in front of people. "Would you like me to sing you something?" I ask her, part of me hoping she’ll say I don’t have to.

Her smile broadens. I can’t help noticing how it lights up her entire face as it grows, as if her joy is too much for her to contain. "Yes, please."

That smile is impossible to deny. "All right. Close your eyes." She obeys, and I pause, wondering what would be a good song for this. My mind lights on one, an old Beatles song I heard once on some radio station. I’m not sure why it stayed with me; I suppose I just liked the melody. I sing it to Moira:

_"Let me take you down, ‘cause I’m going to / Strawberry Fields / Nothing is real / And nothing to get hung about / Strawberry Fields forever." ___

Her eyes pop open, and she smiles again. "I know this song," she says eagerly.

“Really,” I answer, smiling back at her. “Do you like it?”

“Yes. It’s about strawberries.”

“Not only about that, love,” I tell her. “It’s about a place. A special place you can go, when you’re upset or angry. There, there’s no trouble and nothing to be afraid of.” I pause, wondering how I’ve suddenly become a brilliant storyteller. “It’s a beautiful place.”

Her eyes widen. “Have you been there?” she gasps.

I laugh. “Yes, I have.” Grinning, she closes her eyes again and sings along softly to the next verse. A slight shiver goes up my spine as I hear her, a perfect octave above my own voice:

_“Living is easy with eyes closed / Misunderstanding all you see / It’s getting hard to be someone, but it all works out / It doesn’t matter much to me / Let me take you down, 'cause I'm going to / Strawberry Fields / Nothing is real / And nothing to get hung about / Strawberry Fields forever.” ___

Moira’s eyes open once more, but slower than before. “What does it look like? Strawberry Fields?”

I think for a moment. “Well, I think it depends on the person,” I tell her.

“What’s yours look like, then?”

“It’s in a palace. A big, white palace, with rooms full of things that I can visit anytime. There’s one room with nothing in it except good things. Yours probably looks different.”

“I don’t know. Never been to it.”

“Well, close your eyes again, and you’ll see it before you know it.”

"Okay." She closes her eyes again, and I can see her limbs relaxing under the comforter. I go on with the song.

_"No one I think is in my tree / I mean, it must be high or low / That is, you can’t, you know, tune in, but it’s all right / That is, I think it’s not too bad / Let me take you down, 'cause I'm going to / Strawberry Fields / Nothing is real / And nothing to get hung about / Strawberry Fields forever." ___

Somewhere in the middle of the verse, Moira’s breathing starts to even and deepen. Her head droops over to one side. Amazing: less than a minute ago, she was still fairly awake. One arm, curled around the ragged teddy bear, pokes out from under the comforter. I give in to the sudden impulse and put my hand on hers, and her hand vanishes, completely dwarfed by mine. I obviously don’t need to, but I sing the final verse and chorus.

_"Always know, sometimes think it’s me / But you know, I know when it’s a dream / I think a no, I mean a yes, but it’s all wrong / That is, I think I disagree / Let me take you down, ‘cause I’m going to / Strawberry fields / Nothing is real / And nothing to get hung about / Strawberry fields forever / Strawberry fields forever / Strawberry fields forever.” ___

I put my hand in Moira’s hair, feeling the smooth dark curls tickling my palm. Strange…I’ve heard the phrase “heartwarming” before, but I never believed, until feeling warmth in my own chest as I look at her, that it could have a literal meaning. I stand as quietly as I can, brushing her cheek with one hand as I remove it from her hair, and turn off the lights behind me.

When I come back into the hallway, Molly’s waiting for me, her arms folded tightly across her chest. I can feel heat rising in my face as I realize she heard me singing. I try to think of something to say, but as we step back into the sitting-room, she speaks before I do. "Don’t think that this makes everything all right."

"What’s that supposed to mean?"

Molly turns and glares at me, her cheeks a blotchy red. "You know damn well, Sherlock. You’ve been gone for Moira’s entire life. Suddenly showing up and talking and...and singing to her doesn’t reverse that fact."

"I know it doesn’t. But I’m back now and I have to start somewhere."

"You’re back now," she repeats scathingly. Her eyes spark with an angry fire. "As if that makes up for two years of being a ghost to her, and to me."

"I suppose nothing I say will calm you down," I sigh. Mistake: Molly’s face goes redder than ever and she starts to yell, seemingly with no reservations about possibly waking Moira.

"No, it bloody won’t! Do you have any idea what it’s like to raise a child for two years, never knowing if she’ll ever meet the other half of her family? Do you have any clue what that does to people? One phone call, one text, one _something _was all we would’ve needed! And you could’ve done that for us! You did it for your brother, and you don't even..."__

She pauses. "Go on," I snarl back. "I don't even what?"

"You don't even care about him," she says. "But I could hardly call your feelings towards me and Moira that. Leaving us with nothing isn't caring."

That stings. "You don't understand," I protest. "There are things you're not taking into consideration."

"Enlighten me, then."

"I couldn’t just contact you. You know Moriarty’s criminal network was still out there when I left. If I’d tried to speak to you, you might’ve said something amiss later, revealed you helped me and put yourself and Moira in danger."

"Oh, so _I’m _in the wrong for wanting my daughter to know her father," she rants, a terrible sarcasm in her voice. "Why am I not surprised? I should’ve known I’d be the one wrong here, because the great, brilliant Sherlock-fucking-Holmes is never wrong!"__

"Molly," I begin, but she marches to the door, her face still red, her ponytail swinging furiously. She yanks the door open so hard the knocker smacks against it.

"Get out," she snarls. When I don't move, she screams, "You heard me! Get the fuck out of my house!"

"Fine." I take my coat and scarf from the rack behind the door and brush past her. On the threshold, I turn back and put one hand on the door to stop her from closing it. "I'll watch Moira next time you go to work." When she starts to protest, I go on. "You're going to let me see her again, and I don't care what I have to do to make that happen. I have a right: she's my daughter too, as you have so graciously reminded me."

"I could keep her from you, you know," Molly says, narrowing her eyes maliciously. "Give you a taste of what it’s like to be separated from the one you love."

Surprise temporarily renders me speechless. Molly implies that someone she loved was gone, and if our actions on the night before I left England are any indication, she’s referring to me. I don’t remember her saying a word about love last time I was with her. But what surprises me more is her unspoken assumption that I’m capable of feeling love too. For a long time, I don’t speak, wondering what on earth I’m supposed to say in response to these implications.

Finally I come up with something. "You can keep Moira from me, but you won’t. You want her to know me. And though I appreciate your offer to show me what it’s like to be separated from loved ones," I add sardonically, "I’m already well aware of how it feels."

I barely register the fact that Molly’s face is flushed again, with something more than anger. I turn away from her and start towards the stairs, but a thought occurs to me and I turn back again. "By the way, you can expect to receive a two-month-old black kitten from the London Humane Society on Christmas Eve. I’ve already paid for him and told them to bring him here. If I can’t make it, tell Moira he’s from me."

Before Molly answers, I turn and walk alone down the stairs. Part of me wonders if she’ll follow me (though what reason she’d have for that, I don’t know), but I don’t look back to see. The door closes with a distant, hollow echo behind me; she doesn’t slam it.

I suppose that’s a good sign.  
_______________

A few hours after my conversation with Molly, Moira finally opens her eyes. I’d known she wasn’t in a coma, but at the sight of the two (currently) green-gold spheres reflecting the streetlamp light from outside, a knot of tension I hadn’t even noticed inside my stomach suddenly comes undone. Waves of relief wash over me so fast it makes my head whirl. It’s all I can do to stay seated, to not scoop her up in my arms and cover her bandaged face with kisses.

Moira yawns. Her eyes are filled with a dreamy haze from the morphine, and for a minute I wonder if she can even register her own surroundings. Slowly, her head turns to where Molly sits, still holding her hand, and where John is awakening in the plastic chair. She grins.

“Hi, Mummy. Hi, Uncle John,” she whispers, her voice a bit slurred.

Molly’s shoulders tremble, and I see sparkling tears escaping her eyes. But her voice is remarkably steady as she answers, “Hello, darling. Before you ask,” she says quickly, laying a hand on Moira’s shoulder, “I fed Khan before I left.”

“Good. Did you tell him I’m sorry?”

Molly gives a strained, trembling smile. “Yes, of course I did.” Moira’s eyes narrow slightly; she can tell it’s a lie, of course. But she nods.

At the sound of their voices, John’s eyes fly open. “Moira!” he exclaims, bounding from the chair and gently placing one hand on her small shoulder. Turning to me, he says sharply, “Call the nurse in here, Sherlock. They need to know she’s awake.” I obey, pressing the call button more times than is strictly necessary.

At the sound of my name, Moira looks around the room dazedly. “Daddy?” she asks.

I get to my feet at last, doing my best not to allow my knees to collapse under me with the relief. Standing beside John, I put a hand in her hair. “I’m here, Moira,” I tell her, my voice shaking hard. “How do you feel?”

She closes her eyes and grins even wider. “My face still hurts. But I feel great.”

That would be the morphine talking. For a wild, wonderful moment, I actually laugh, and John laughs too. Molly joins in, and her laugh grows and grows until finally it breaks down into a sob. She lets go of Moira for the first time in hours, burying her face in both hands. Something’s missing from her hand, and after a moment I realize what: her engagement ring. I hadn’t noticed that she forgot to put it back on.

“What’s wrong, Mummy?” Moira says vaguely.

Molly can’t even answer, she’s crying so hard. I’ve never seen her break down like this, not even when she first saw Moira’s bandaged legs. “I think she’s happy,” John says quietly.

Then, fear grips at my heart once again as I remember the doctor’s uncertainty about paralysis. I shouldn’t be asking her to do this so soon, but…I can’t take it anymore. I have to know, and so does Molly. “Do me a favor, Moira.”

“What?”

“Can you try and move one of your legs for me?”

Molly’s tear-streaked face appears from behind her hands. “It’s too soon, Sherlock, don’t make her do that,” she says thickly.

“She’s right. It’s not a good idea at this point,” John agrees.

“No, no, I can try!” Moira says, determination in her voice. She closes her eyes and her dark eyebrows contract as she focuses on what I’ve asked her to do. Molly, John and I all look towards the lump in the sheets that is her left leg. Although none of us speak, their pale faces tell me they’re thinking the same thing I am: _Please, please, Moira, move it… ___

The sheets move. I know I’m not seeing things, they move. Only by a fraction of an inch, but I see them shifting, hear them rustle slightly. Another warm, delicious wave of relief sweeps over me, enough to almost knock me over. _She can move. ___

Moira’s face relaxes as she goes still again. Her eyes glisten with tears; moving her leg, even that tiny amount, was obviously painful. But she doesn’t cry. Instead, with a courage I consider quite incredible, she smiles. “I did it,” she says proudly.

Molly’s face sinks back into her hands again with a fresh wave of joyful sobs. “Good girl,” John stammers, his voice cracking.

Funny. My eyes are stinging, and it’s not even allergy season. I close them and take a calming breath, wondering how I’m holding in the impulse to run through the streets yelling that my daughter’s going to be able to walk again. John puts a steady, reassuring hand on my shoulder, and I spin around and hug him. As I release him, he pats me awkwardly on the back and mutters, grinning, “Now people will start talking again.”

I laugh and turn back to Molly, and her face gradually emerges from her hands. By the light of the streetlamp outside the window, I see a strange blazing look in her wet eyes. Before I know quite what’s happening, she leaps from the chair, accidentally knocking John aside, and throws her arms around my neck. I can feel her tears sinking through my coat shoulder.

For once, I don’t think. As Molly starts to let me go, I place both hands on her shoulders, bend down, and our lips lock together. After only a millisecond’s hesitation, her arms come around me and the kiss deepens to its fullest. With a wild, dizzying ecstasy, I revel in the sweetness of her mouth, the feeling of her thin fingers in my hair and her heart pounding against my chest. All is precisely as I remember it. How I survived the last two years with only mental replays of this is a mystery that I’ll never solve. And to be honest, I have no desire to solve it.

Her engagement ring bounces noisily across the tiled floor, but neither Molly nor I completely register the sound.


End file.
